[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip]
Wonder how long before the kid gets brought in for a three-way. Not that there’s anything wrong with that!
[/QUOTE]
Good god, I’m going to be howling over this all frickin’ week! Well done!
Has it occurred to anyone that this child may be tapped for further study into genetics and the medical ramifications of incest? I’m hoping that candidates for this type of scientific study in the human species would be rare enough that scientists will look at this as a golden opportunity.
Could be a significant contribution to science, but sad for the kid.
[QUOTE=Kalhoun]
I thought I read somewhere that cousins produce more defects that closer blood relations do. Anyone got a stat?
[/QUOTE]
I don’t have stats, but I do have a family story. My great great aunties had a feud over something to the point that they never talked again, one living in Canada and one just across the lake in NY. My great aunt was born in NY. A few months later my great uncle in Canada. They met when 20, eloped, and came home to find out they were related (OKAY - so that’s the “family” version. Take that with a grain of salt b/c my mother’s family was wont to change facts when it suited them.) They tried numerous times to have children and every single one (like 4-5) was either miscarried or stillborn. They remained childless their 45yr marriage.
I don’t know if it’s because of my family history, but I don’t find the first cousin relationship all that ickky. Father/daughter? That’s some fucked up shit especially as they knew the blood ties. And then to plaster that poor innocent’s face in the paper for their 15 mins? They deserve to suffer any sort of social condemnation hurled at them.
First cousin marriage is very common in some places, in particular, some places in Europe and the Middle East. And so far as I know, it’s generally legal in the United States (I know for sure that it’s legal in Ohio). Despite your anecdote, I think if there were huge risks associated with it, the evidence would be available to look at.
[QUOTE=Alice The Goon]
I’d think people would be naturally less attracted to those close to them genetically. Women use smell to determine those that have different genetics than them, simply put, because natural selection favors those with a wide variety of genes. As for why this happens sometimes, I’d think that for people with poor boundaries, the bonding love can feel like romantic love to them, and they get caught up in it. It’s a completely wrong decision, in my opinion, to let it develop into having children together. Where’s that pukey smiley?
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, I would think that, too. Hmmm.
I guess it’s also worrying to think that even though this guy wasn’t her father growing up, perhaps he still represents “father figure” and in this way has power over her that he might not have? Then again, she is an adult.
Yes, it feels ick and wrong, but why does it feel that way? I suppose whenever you hear about a father having sex with his child, your mind goes to the fact that someone weaker is being taken advantage of. It just feels so ingrained.
[QUOTE=Freudian Slit]
Yes, it feels ick and wrong, but why does it feel that way? I suppose whenever you hear about a father having sex with his child, your mind goes to the fact that someone weaker is being taken advantage of. It just feels so ingrained.
[/QUOTE]
I think it is ingrained. I think most young victims of molestation feel the wrongness, even before they’re aware of the laws and taboos against it. We know our place in the family structure, our role, and I think we’re naturally uncomfortable when the roles are skewed.
[QUOTE=Freudian Slit]
Yes, it feels ick and wrong, but why does it feel that way? I suppose whenever you hear about a father having sex with his child, your mind goes to the fact that someone weaker is being taken advantage of. It just feels so ingrained.
[/QUOTE]
It’s an interesting anthropological subject. IIRC from the anthro course I took 20 years ago, the prevailing theory at the time was that if not for the incest taboo, the father would invariably choose the daughter over the wife (being younger and hence more apt to successfully reproduce). The big problem (they thought) was surprisingly not the increased risk of genetic defects, but the breakdown of the family unit.
Nobody bother asking me for cites, this is all from memory from an anthropology course in like 1988. I concede I may be misremembering, and even if I am remembering accurately it may no longer be the prevailing theory.
Heh, as soon as I read about this I knew there’d be a Pit thread about it.
All I can say is if we’re going to protest unions because they’re emotionally or socially dysfunctional, or because they have an increased genetic risk or ensure psychological trauma to their children, then we’re not protesting only incestuous unions anymore.
FYI, there’s interesting data about the incest taboo on Wikipedia:
[QUOTE=AudreyK]
All I can say is if we’re going to protest unions because they’re emotionally or socially dysfunctional, or because they have an increased genetic risk or ensure psychological trauma to their children, then we’re not protesting only incestuous unions anymore.
[/QUOTE]
Explain, please. Most unions aren’t inherently dysfunctional. They don’t start that way, anyhow.
If the Deaves couple wanted to be together, if they were really “in love”, they should have had the common sense to hide their blood relationship and not have children.
[QUOTE=AuntiePam]
Explain, please. Most unions aren’t inherently dysfunctional. They don’t start that way, anyhow.
[/quote]
Excellent example of circular reasoning.
You argue that this union’s social dysfunctionality is a good reason to oppose it. Yet this begs the very question that needs to be answered–whether the union is, in fact, inherently dysfunctional. You base your argument on the very assumption that needs questioning in the first place.
[QUOTE=AuntiePam]
Explain, please. Most unions aren’t inherently dysfunctional. They don’t start that way, anyhow.
[/QUOTE]
What about couples who have genetic diseases? If we are forbidding incestuous couples to have children because of the potential for genetic defects, there are plenty of other people to whom the same principle could be applied.
[QUOTE=Revtim]
It’s an interesting anthropological subject. IIRC from the anthro course I took 20 years ago, the prevailing theory at the time was that if not for the incest taboo, the father would invariably choose the daughter over the wife (being younger and hence more apt to successfully reproduce). The big problem (they thought) was surprisingly not the increased risk of genetic defects, but the breakdown of the family unit.
Nobody bother asking me for cites, this is all from memory from an anthropology course in like 1988. I concede I may be misremembering, and even if I am remembering accurately it may no longer be the prevailing theory.
[/QUOTE]
I remember much the same from my anthro course in college. It’s not the age disparity that squiks me out–it’s the role confusion and the offspring. The family has set roles (or did)–this basically erases them. I have no problem with other “non-traditional” families: single parent, gay parents, grandparents raising grandkids etc. But this goes between generations and straight into Greek tragedy. I cannot believe they would put this on a child. I think this should be illegal due to the sociological aspects of it. And of course, his crowing about the sex just adds to the ick. If he’s around long enough, will he do his daughter/granddaughter, too?* That’s bound to be amazing for 90 year old him.
*I don’t think the daughter is a victim here–I think poor Celeste is and in the worst way. And Vinyl Turnip–you made me spew tea! well done, sir.
It’s now being reported that the father has a prior relationship with his daughter, despite their claims they only met after she turned 30…
So, wait, he’s not her father after all?
There’s always more to the story than meets the eye.
[QUOTE=FriarTed]
I’m not surprised by the amount of people who aren’t disturbed by this. In ten years, they may well be in the vast majority here and a slight majority in society. Then, the debate will be about consensual sex between a 21 y/o offspring & a mid-30s parent who were never separated.
[/QUOTE]
Well, I’m certainly disturbed, and I’m usually one of the “as long as they aren’t hurting anyone and/or doing it out in the street and scaring the horses.”
This, however, is majorly disgusting. Is anyone else thinking of a plotline for V. C. Andrews (if she wasn’t dead, that is)?
[QUOTE=acsenray]
So, wait, he’s not her father after all?
[/QUOTE]
No, he is her father.
Their story initially was that he had left her mother when she was an infant (or possibly before she was born), but they didn’t meet again until she was thirty or so, and then she fell in love with him and pursued a relationship that he initially resisted then gave in to.
His ex wife (not the daughter’s mother, another woman he married afterwards) claims that this is a lie, that the daughter came to stay with them for a week when they got married in 1984, then spent four separate occasions with them until 2000 when the daughter and the father went away together, and the wife left him.
Essentially their argument was that they didn’t know each other until she was an adult, but now it’s being claimed that they had a prior relationship when she was still a minor.
[QUOTE=Guinastasia]
Is anyone else thinking of a plotline for V. C. Andrews (if she wasn’t dead, that is)?
[/QUOTE]
When has being dead ever stopped V.C. Andrews from writing new books?
The only incest that isn’t taboo that I can think of would be cousin marriages-and that’s mainly in royal families, and it’s usually distant cousins. If it’s even done. Sometimes you had first cousins, but that’s about it. (Queen Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert, were first cousins. Elizabeth and Phillip are also cousins, although not that close).
To be fair, the big incest problems usually show up after generations of inbreeding. Still…eeeewwww.
[QUOTE=Miller]
When has being dead ever stopped V.C. Andrews from writing new books?
[/QUOTE]
Heh
I refuse to acknowledge most of the ghostwriter’s works. Can we say sucks like a dustbuster? Some of them were okay, but most of them were a major tragedy to the forests.